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HOME NEW ZEALAND / 31
Have you ever been on holiday at your bach or crib and not wanted to go home? After Heather Coyne and Mark Winter spent their first summer in their new bach designed by architect Evan Mayo on Marine Parade at Mount Maunganui, they loved it so much they couldn’t face returning to their old life in Hamilton, so they made their bach their permanent home. “We call it our sea change,” says Heather. “We came for Christmas and we didn’t go back.”
Having recently sold half the property investment business they’d founded together, and with their adult children having families of their own, it was the right time for a move. Heather packed up their corporate wardrobes and sent them to a hospice shop. By all accounts the move has been a great success. “People say, ‘You look so relaxed’. They haven’t said that to me for 40 years,” says Mark.
The beachfront at Mount Maunganui has more than its fair share of Italianate monstrosities and oblong plaster palace s, obese structures sited oppressively
SEACHANGEProject 03
Beach house
Architect
Evan Mayo, Architecture Bureau
LocAtion
Mount Maunganui
Brief
To create a holiday getaway without removing the site’s original beach cottage
01 / Deck02 / Kitchen03 / Living04 / Bedroom05 / Hallway06 / Laundry07 / Toilet08 / Bathroom09/ Wardrobe10/ Ensuite
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0302 04
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HOME NEW ZEALAND / 3332 / HOME NEW ZEALAND
close to the road, like forwards ready for a scrum. They feel, perhaps, more suited to the Gold Coast than New Zealand. Because of this, the arrival of a small, simple house screened by a pohutukawa tree, a house that nestles as if atop a dune at the rear of an 860-square-metre site, is something of a pleasant oddity. Also unusual is the fact that Mark and Heather have retained the original classic bach on the front of the site – one of the few that now remain on this strip of prime real estate.
Evan, the new bach’s architect, is a stay-at-home dad who set up his own company, Architecture Bureau, in Hamilton four years ago. He had already established a good relationship with Heather and Mark when he designed a renovation of their Hamilton home. Here at Mount Maunganui, his first step was to reshape the site by raising the land level at the rear and establish a platform for the new building that allowed views to the beach. This modification also helped achieve a bal-anced relationship between the two dwellings.
Visitors arrive at the new building by walking up generous steps through naturalistic landscaping to the front deck, which invites you to sprawl in the sun or shade. There is no formal entrance, as the living area can be entirely opened up to the east. The prevailing wind comes from the west, hence the house hunkers down at the back. An extended eave over the deck
Project 03 / Beach house Pro:03
Above The exterior of the house is painted in Resene ‘Bokara Grey’. On the far right is an all-weather barbecue area, tucked discreetly out of sight.
Previous page Heather and Mark have teamed their decades-old dining table with ‘Louis Ghost’ chairs by Philippe Starck for Kartell. Heather found the pen-dant lights overhead on TradeMe – they’d previ-ously been installed in a barn. In the living space opposite are ‘Shell’ chairs by Hans Wegner for Fritz Hansen, their sandy wood the ideal partner for the home’s American white oak floorboards.
Far right The low-maintenance gardens are planted with grasses, cycads and pohutukawa.
Right The new home’s deck extends towards the old bach at the front of the property, where Mamasita ‘Acapulco’ chairs from Mexico are joined by a pair of neon flamingos, another TradeMe find.
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Far right, top Built in the 1920s, Heather and Mark have affec-tionately dubbed the old two-bedroom bach “The Shack”.
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teXt / Andrea Hotere PhotoGrAPhY / Florence Noble
says it was a fantastic antidote to an earlier experience spending weekends in a nearby apartment.
A valuer by profession – “until I realised why I was constantly frustrated” – Mark is well aware of how values are ascribed to properties, with square meter-age so often reigning supreme. Here, he and Heather boldly ignored many of the so-called “rules” of the profession in favour of the intangible aspects of their unique property.
Since Mark and Heather made their move to live permanently in the new bach, they’ve been followed to the Mount from the Waikato by Mark’s mum, and from Auckland by son Simon, daughter Dana and their respective young families, including Mark and Heather’s grandchildren Jackson, Ava and Frankie, which has proved a positive change for all concerned. “What a place for kids to grow up,” says Mark. “You don’t need to go somewhere in the weekend to get away from it.”
Project 03 / Beach house Pro:03
offers shade and shelter, as well as providing discrete passive ventilation of the roof cavity via a ventilated double fascia board. Electronically controlled high-level westerly windows also allow the building to ‘breathe’, and counteract overheating when the large glass sliding doors are closed to cope with the occasional wet easterly.
While at first glance the 135-square-metre house feels like a one-bedroom bach (with the main bedroom and ensuite over the carport), there are in fact another three bedrooms, and a bathroom and guest toilet, tucked in the rear off a narrow corridor. Sliding doors to those back bedrooms, as well as sliding mosquito and louvered screens and the absence of curtains, gives the rear of the house a clean, almost Japanese sensibility, and helps ensure the usability of every inch of space.
Mark says he had only one request at the start: that Evan use plywood, something the architect took to heart. While the exterior of the house is Shadowclad ply, hoop-pine plywood has been used to create elegant cupboards in the living space, as well as in perforated ceiling panels, which both look good and absorb sound.
At the front of the section the old bach, with its circa-1920s plaster and batten ceiling and timber panelling, now doubles as a home office and spare bedroom, and also offers a fireplace with a view of the sea. The place feels quaint, moody and romantic; Mark
Above right The new home’s interior is painted in Resene ‘Bianca’. In winter, the living space in warmed by a Focus ‘Ergofocus’ fireplace designed by Dominique Imbert.
Above left Basic main-tenance aside, the old bach remains untouched. The items within it are suitably aged: in the living room a portrait of Mark’s great-great-great-grandfather resides alongside a set of antique decanters and ceramics purchased 30 years ago on trips to Thailand and Macau.
Top left Designed by Evan, the kitchen cabinets were built by Fernlea Cabinetry & Joinery. The bench is deliberately positioned to take in the view.
Top right Hoop pine wall panels cleverly obscure the control mechanisms for the high-level windows. The laundry area extends to the right behind Mark.
Above, centre The guest bedroom at the end of the hallway includes a handsome in-built bookshelf stacked with tomes for beachside reading.
Above left Heather and Jackson in one of the three guest rooms, fitted with a wall light from Eurotech Lighting and a ‘Line One’ bed by Bob McDonald Design.
Above right Natural light is let into the hall-way via ceiling panels made from Ampelite Dualroof Max and mac-rocarpa battens.
HOME NEW ZEALAND / 35
kitchens
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spirited awayThis holiday home has a scullery that tucks away behind folding doors.
kitchen 02
Mount Maunganui kitchen
designer
Evan Mayo, Architecture Bureau
Location
Mount Maunganui
Brief
To design a spacious kitchen for a compact home
HOME Most sculleries are dark, tucked-away spaces. What made you want to incorporate one in this kitchen, and how successful has it been? Evan Mayo at a holiday home you often have lots of friends and family around, so one of the key ideas around putting the pantry/scullery to one side of the kitchen – behind fold-away doors that match the wall colour – was that other family members and guests could be involved in preparation, cooking and conversation without crowding the kitchen. [The homeowners] required all the kitchen and pantry space they could get, but we also didn’t want the kitchen to become the dominant element of the living area. It works really well, and easily handles numerous people working in the kitchen area with ease.
This kitchen is part of a holiday home (that has now become a permanent home). How did that influence your material choices at the outset? The original material choice was about keeping things feeling simple and relaxed, and robust enough to feel solid and able to handle the wear and tear of a busy extended family on holiday.
How much of a difference do the acoustic panels on the ceiling and walls make to the overall acoustic quality of the space? They help take the edge off the general noise level when the main doors are closed along the front of the living, dining and kitchen area.
Lighting Wall lights: ‘S372 2BS Rectangular Double Spot Light’ from Halcyon Lighting. Pendants: purchased second hand from TradeMe Bar stooLs ‘H’ stools by Xavier Pauchard for TolixappLiances Miele ‘KFN9755’ fridge and freezer units, Smeg ‘CS191D6’ freestanding oven and induction top, and Fisher & Paykel
DishDrawers, all from Kitchen Things, kitchenthings.co.nzacoustic and FLat waLL and ceiLing paneLs Hoop pine white interior pLywood ‘SR3310-CF’ from Decortech caBinet Maker Fernlea Cabinetry & Joinery, 07 847 2027 tapware Paini ‘Cox’ mixer from Mico, mico.co.nz
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